This invention relates to a carrier for articles, usually bottles, and more particularly, to an improved handle portion for a basket-type carrier designed for glass bottles.
In general, a basket-type carrier has a bottom wall, side and end walls, a center partition, and transverse dividers which form cells on each side of the center partition. Since I.C.C. regulations require that bottles be separated from each other by a minimum of 0.04 inches (40 point) thickness of board, it is customary to manufacture the carrier from a blank of 21 point board, and design the carrier so as to provide double thicknesses of board in those areas which space the bottles apart.
These carriers typically provide a thin planar handle portion consisting of a simple opening formed on the upper portion of a central partition of the carrier through which the fingers of a hand can be inserted. Several board plies are arranged at least in the upper portion of the central partition to form a thicker and therefore stronger region surrounding the handle portion; the reinforcing extra plies are ordinarily glued to the plies forming the central partition. The handle portion thus consists essentially of a hand opening which has been formed in these multiple layers of board.
This type of thin handle construction is subject to an unfavorably distributed amount of tension from vertical pull as well as an increased degree of fatigue due to flexion from lateral torques. That is, the vertical tension or load bearing force applied to the handle when the carrier is lifted and carried is transmitted largely through the area immediately above the lateral ends of the hand opening. Likewise, lateral twisting or angular motion about the vertical axis of the carrier will result in flexion stresses in the same immediate area of the hand opening. The result is an increase in fatigue and wear in this region of the handle. Further, a thin interior surface edge is also presented in the hand opening of a carrier of this type which will tend to "bite" into the hand of an individual carrying a loaded carrier, causing discomfort and difficulty in handling the carrier.
An improved bottle carrier of the basket-type is shown in my U.S. Pat. No. 4,240,546. The carrier is first formed as a tube having a bottom wall, end walls and a top wall. The upper four corners of the tube are provided with a gusset structure consisting of triangular gusset panels taken from the end wall. The apexes of the gusset panels are spaced from each other at the central portion of the top wall in order to create a sculptured effect, and to provide ready removability of full or empty bottles from the carrier.
In assembly, the two sides of the top wall of the '546 carrier are folded downwardly through approximately 90.degree. to form a two-ply center partition. The two major center panels of the partition are folded on a center fold line which does not extend all the way to each end wall. The ends of the fold line cooperate with the apexes of the gusset structure at each end of the carrier to form a curved triangular section thereby imparting to the upper portion of the carrier a three-dimensional, sculptured appearance. The center partition structure as described above has several additional advantages. It provides a degree of bracing and rigidity to the carrier, and the downwardly-curving triangular sections reduce the height of the carrier at its end walls by about three quarters of an inch. The full depth center partition further provides double-thickness protection between the two rows of bottles, and more particularly, the bottles at the corners are cushioned by virtue of the maintained spacing apart of the major center panels by the triangular sections. The center partition also distributes the load bearing more evenly down the end walls of the carrier to the bottom wall.